Nosing around for an insider dining experience? Indulge in a dinner served inside the kitchen. A handful of Twin Cities restaurants manage to squeeze a table onto the equivalent of the factory floor, but the pick of the litter is the chef's table at Heidi's, a ringside seat (or seats: minimum four and maximum 10 diners) for chef Stewart Woodman's prodigiously creative tasting menu.

Runner-up: Cosmos